The Test Bed

Cases get cooler as gamers get more power hungry

Wed, 27 Aug 2008 10:54:51 GMT

Coolermaster is best known for its cooling products but it also make systems cases. It has decided to split its product line between those aimed at mainstream users, and those for gamers who tend to have very different requirements. This...

Free backup utility will create bootable USB drives

Tue, 26 Aug 2008 16:56:07 GMT

Back-up and data-management specialist Paragon has made its latest Drive Backup 9.0 Express software freely available for download. It offers basic backup and recovery tools and the ability to create a bootable flash drive to enable the recovery of entire systems....

Belkin gives audio cables the magnetic slip

Fri, 22 Aug 2008 17:49:16 GMT

Apple got a lot of Brownie points for its magnetic notebook power input, which pulls off when you trip over the lead to that you do not drag the notebook to the ground. In practice you can detach it by...

The leaves are falling off Photosynth

Thu, 21 Aug 2008 17:17:00 GMT

Well that's what Microsoft's new Photosynth website - just released from its long beta phase - keeps telling us. Photosynth is now live for users to create their own 'synths', although every time we try to view one we get...

ADSL customers left out in the cold as dual-band routers surface

Thu, 21 Aug 2008 14:03:01 GMT

D-Link launched its DIR-855 dual-band router earlier this month, and now Linksys has announced its rival WRT610N model at £149.99. Dual-band means it can operate on both 802.11g's 2.4GHz spectrum and the much less cluttered 5GHz using 802.11n. With...

Intel systems-on-a-chip are still too power hungry

Thu, 21 Aug 2008 13:04:27 GMT

Arguably the most interesting announcement to come out of the Intel Developer Forum was the CE 3100 system-on-a-chip, which shows the company exploiting miniaturisation for purposes other than increasing raw computing power. Instead of packing in more cores, it is...

O Bold, where art thou?

Wed, 20 Aug 2008 17:33:10 GMT

When Blackberry came in to show off its new Bold handset a couple of weeks back, we were assured it would be available mid-August. However, with stores such as The Carphone Warehouse still listing it as 'coming soon', there...

USB hub gets networked

Tue, 19 Aug 2008 11:47:36 GMT

Following our blog yesterday about Lindy's sharable USB hub, which can be switched between two PCs, we got a press release from the Taiwanese company Pilotech about a networkable four-port USB 2.0 hub. According to Pilotech, devices attached to the ...

Switchable hub - use with care

Mon, 18 Aug 2008 11:47:10 GMT

Lindy's £34.99 (inc Vat)USB 2.0 four-port sharing hub allows two machines to share scanners, printers and other peripherals. You switch the hub to whichever machine needs access; either or both can be a Mac or PC. We haven't seen the...

Free remote control

Thu, 14 Aug 2008 14:18:57 GMT

The German company TeamViewer is making its flagship remote control product available free for private use. Rival Logmein offers a similar deal and GotomyPC is available as a free trial.Teamview looks good for providing instant support to friends or customers,...

Bring back the command line, all is forgiven...

Tue, 12 Aug 2008 12:03:12 GMT

The advent of graphical interfaces such as Windows and the MacOS was rightly hailed as an advance in usability, but as anyone who ever used Unix or pre-Windows DOS will know they could make some tasks more cumbersome and less...

Passport to a rip-off?

Tue, 12 Aug 2008 11:39:48 GMT

If you Google the Passport Office and click on the first available links, you might be surprised to be told that the only way to get information is via a £1.50-a-minute phone call. Is this what we pay our...

Intel Nehalem to be called Core i7

Sun, 10 Aug 2008 23:41:45 GMT

Intel has just announced that the upcoming 45nm 'Nehalem' processors will carry the Core i7 moniker. The logos above show the variants for mainstream models (blue) and the Extreme Editions (black). Nehalem is due to launch by the...

Lock up your daughter's webcam?

Fri, 08 Aug 2008 15:34:15 GMT

There have been two reports in the past week of men getting into trouble for hacking into the computers to spy on young women through their webcams. One man gained access by sending his victim a Trojan by email and...

Blackberry Bold available next week

Thu, 07 Aug 2008 11:35:52 GMT

We met up with Blackberry this morning to see its new Bold handset up close. Announced back in May, the Bold will be available to buy towards the end of next week. The handset certainly looks impressive and...

Lessons of hacking case

Wed, 06 Aug 2008 16:04:36 GMT

The alleged hacking ring that is said to have stolen 40 million bank-card details in the US is likely to increase calls for a new look at UK laws. Only last month a House of Lords committee reiterated earlier calls...

Lenovo unveils Atom-powered laptops

Tue, 05 Aug 2008 10:10:15 GMT

Scrambling onto a passing bandwagon isn't something Lenovo does very often, but the exploding popularity of netbooks has prompted it to join the fray of Atom-based products. The IdeaPad S9 (8.9in screen) and S10 (10.2in screen) come in some...

2,000-year old computer may have been calendar widget

Thu, 31 Jul 2008 10:17:44 GMT

A new report in Nature about the mysterious Antikythera Mechanism - a clockwork computer dating from around 150BC - suggests that it may have been used to calculate the relationships between the various astronomical calendars in use in ancient Greece, and...

Asus Eee Box to cost £199, runs XP

Wed, 30 Jul 2008 10:08:05 GMT

Asus today announced UK pricing for its Eee Box PC, the desktop version of the Eee PC 'netbook'. Available from September, the two models of the Eee Box (white or black) will retail at £199. In a departure from the...

Samsung launches 8-megapixel camera phone

Thu, 24 Jul 2008 16:18:12 GMT

Samsung has just announced its INNOV8 handset (yes, that's pronounced 'innovate'), with its main 'innovation' being a built-in 8-megapixel camera. Based on Symbian OS v9.3, the handset is clearly hoping to replace the humble digicam and comes complete with...

Improving the Eee PC's battery life

Wed, 23 Jul 2008 17:12:59 GMT

We've had the odd complaint about poor battery life from Celeron M based Eee PCs, especially since our Eee PC 701 and Eee PC 900 review units lasted a very reasonable 2 hours 15 mins and 2 hours 49...

1&1 quick to use debt collectors

Wed, 23 Jul 2008 16:04:09 GMT

Domain name and hosting provider 1&1 was quick to fire out threats from debt collectors to both myself and a friend recently. Like any tech-heads, we've both got hosting packages and domain names bought from several companies including 34SP, CWSHosting,...

Parrot brings NFC to the Party

Tue, 22 Jul 2008 21:40:03 GMT

NFC (near-field communications) could be a buzzword you'll soon be hearing a lot more of over the coming months, particularly in relation to Bluetooth 2.1 devices. Bluetooth 2.1 supports NFC, which is a short-range radio technology similar to that used...

The world's fastest (and most expensive) PC

Tue, 22 Jul 2008 20:38:58 GMT

Never mind benchmarks, how many PCs do you know that can do 211mph and accelerate from 0-62mph in just 4 seconds? Well, we found one at the British Motor Show that can. This ultimate office on wheels is a Brabus SV12...

Garmin's new Nuvi 500: navigate in rain, hail or shine

Tue, 22 Jul 2008 20:09:39 GMT

At the British Motor Show today, Garmin showed off its latest sat nav, the Nuvi 500 series (pictured left). This is Garmin's first attempt at a crossover model that can be configured for use by drivers, walkers, bikers (or...